


Mirage

by sevenofspade



Category: Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: Friendship, Gen, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-10
Updated: 2016-02-10
Packaged: 2018-05-19 14:50:20
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,173
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5970951
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sevenofspade/pseuds/sevenofspade
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This apprenticeship thing is nothing like Rey expected.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Mirage

**Author's Note:**

> Many thanks are owed to [chiiyo86](http://archiveofourown.org/users/chiiyo86/pseuds/chiiyo86) for the last minute beta.

There was so much water out here; Rey found it hard to believe Luke Skywalker was from a desert planet too. It hurt her head a little to think there was this much water in the whole galaxy, much less one planet, much less surrounding her. You could drown in this much water; Rey had never had to fear drowning before.

"You never get used to it," he said, joining her on the edge of the cliff. "Rey. We need to talk."

"Okay," Rey said.

"I have apprentices already," Skywalker said. Before Rey could understand what he meant, he continued, "They don't know I'm a Jedi or about the Force. I'd like to keep it that way."

"Aren't you teaching them?" None of this made sense.

"I've tried teaching," Luke said. He looked away from her. "It didn't work out."

Rey remembered Kylo Ren, the angry red of his lightsaber and the hate in his eyes. Did Luke know? "Han --"

"I know," Luke said.

There was silence, broken only by the breaking of waves, down below.

"I can't teach," Luke said. "I had three days of training with old Ben before he died and three weeks in a swamp with Yoda before _he_ died. You already know how to do handstands."

Rey stayed on the planet. She decided to give it until Finn was recovered before she started looking for a teacher elsewhere.

Luke had three apprentices. 

Rey had met the first two at the same time. The boy, Tahli, was from the local native sentient species and the girl, Lyeppias, from a planet from beyond the Outer Rim, somewhere further out than any world Rey had ever heard off, where they'd only recently learned the news of Palpatine's election to Supreme Chancellor.

Rey had first thought Tahli was meditating when she met him, but Lyeppias had kicked him lightly in the ribs and said, "Yo, Lazybutt, wake up."

Tahli had protested that he had been meditating and his name was Tahli, _Grumpypants_ , and Lyeppias had rolled her eyes. That had pretty much set the tone for their interactions. 

Rey rarely saw Tahli with his eyes open. Luke genuinely seemed to believe he was meditating if his encouragements were anything to go by. Lyeppias would roll her eyes whenever she saw him asleep.

It was hard to tell if Lyeppias genuinely resented that Tahli could spend all day "meditating" or if she was just complaining for the sake of complaining. Lyeppias complained a lot, but she also seemed to enjoy working on Luke's ship.

"Hand me that 9-0-3 wrench," Lyeppias said, from inside the control panel. "There's a loose wire in the connecting circuit."

The wrench skittered across the floor before Rey could pick it up to land in Lyeppias' outstretched hand. 

"Thanks," Lyeppias said.

Lyeppias kept poking at the inside of the wall. The next time she asked for a tool, Rey was ready and handed it to her. She still felt the pull of it against her fingers, though.

"Your name's Rey, right?" asked Lyeppias.

Rey nodded. Realising Lyeppias couldn't see her, she agreed out loud.

"Rey. You shouldn't trust Luke. He's hiding something. Not sure what yet. Sure it's something, though."

"Maybe he has a good reason," Rey said.

"Maybe." 

"Why are you here?" Rey asked. She'd told Luke she wouldn't reveal the Force to the others, but if they talked to her about it, then she wasn't breaking any promise.

Lyeppias unwound her tall, double-kneed frame from the hole and pushed her protective googles up. She gestured upwards. "You see this ship? Supposed to be one of the most reliable ships in the whole galaxy. Been here three months, haven't fixed it yet. Keeps breaking. Don't know why. If I can fix this, I can fix anything."

"Oh," Rey said.

"What, like it's my fault the security droids keep zapping you? They're not that hard to avoid." Lyeppias was scowling again.

"I was a scavenger on Jakku," Rey said. "I get it."

"What's a Jakku?" 

Rey met Luke's third apprentice a week after the other two. There was something off about her. It wasn't her smiles; they were too frequent, but they were sincere. It was only barely the way she always put distance between herself and Luke, both physically and by calling him "Master Luke". It was the fact that, unlike the other two, she knew Luke was teaching them the Force. 

She was avoiding Rey, too. It had been hard to tell because Hrel didn't live in the same part of the temple complex as the rest of them, but she was in fact avoiding Rey in a way that she wasn't the other two.

Hrel would cut her meals short if she saw Rey -- "I'm not hungry anymore, you can have it" -- and leave the rooms Rey was in almost instantly, even into howling winds and drenching rain. When Luke made them work together, mostly building walls or sparring either with Force or lightsabers, eventually Hrel would forget she was avoiding Rey and relax. When it was over, the last stone set, the last punch thrown, the last blow swung, Hrel would remember and something like a curtain would drop behind her eyes.

Rey hated it.

Back on Jakku, if she woke during the night and went for a walk to clear her head before going back to sleep, she did not have to worry about waking anyone up. Here, the stars were different and there was no singing sands -- all walking did was make her ache with grief for home -- but she knew by now that she would find no sleep among the snores of Luke and the other two.

She got up, feet silent upon the floor, and walked out into the night.

"Yes, Master Skywalker," someone said. Jakku was one of few worlds that had auditory mirages, but this planet was not.

"Who are you?" Rey asked.

Hrel startled and jumped half a foot into the air. The man she had been talking to was blue and glowed faintly. Rey supposed he looked a little like Luke, but the problem with humans -- as she'd discovered since leaving Jakku -- was that they all tended to look a lot alike.

He was gone between one blink and the next.

"Who was that?" Rey asked. "And don't say there wasn't anyone. I saw him, I felt him through the Force."

"That was Anakin Skywalker."

"Anakin 'became Darth Vader and now Kylo Ren worships the ground he kriffing walked on' Skywalker?"

"The very same," Hrel said. She sat down on a rock and all the air suddenly left her body. She looked tiny, like that, short and fine-boned like a baby bird.

"Why are you listening to him?" Rey asked. Rey had not known the name 'Darth Vader' until she'd plucked it from Kylo Ren's mind, nor had she known 'Anakin Skywalker' until she had spoken to Luke about Vader.

"At the end, Vader brought down the Empire to save his son." Hrel sighed. "He chose redemption over the Dark Side."

"Then why is he haunting you instead of Kylo Ren? If Vader really wanted to redeem himself, he would start by cleaning up his own grandson," Rey said. 

"He did try! But instead he got me." Hrel gestured at herself and tugged at her sleeve. She was wearing all-black, like she always did, but Rey didn't see what that had to do with anything. Black was a colour like any other. "What a bargain."

Rey sat down on a rock opposite Hrel. She tucked her staff in the crook of her arm. "You're a Knight of Ren?"

"I was." Hrel still wasn't looking at Rey.

"Does Luke know? Are you a spy?" Rey asked. It sounded glamorous when it was Poe spying on the First Order. Not so much when it was Hrel spying on Luke.

"Of course he knows. I was his student before too and unlike some people I don't go around in full-face masks. I used to say anything worth doing was worth doing with your face on it, but I ran like a coward. I told no one where I was going, I tried to get no one to come with me. I still don't know why Master Skywalker guided me here instead of letting me wander the Outer Rim forever." Hrel gestured outwards and looked up; tonight the stars were out in force and Rey might have wept for the beauty of it, on another world, in another life.

"Why did you do it?" Rey asked. 

For a long time, Hrel was silent. Rey hadn't thought she'd needed to specify what she meant, but perhaps she had. 

"I was angry, I was bitter, I was in pain, he was my friend and it seemed like a good idea at the time. Is that what you want me to say? There's no reason I can give that can excuse what I did."

Rey nodded. "If Vader can repent, so can you."

"Vader died. That's the easy road to redemption," Hrel said. "One life is not enough to atone for what I did."

Rey stayed silent.

"I couldn't do it," Hrel said. "If I had to fight the knights, any of them, I couldn't do it. Even with what we did, even with what I did, they're still my friends."

Rey thought about Finn. Brave-hearted, loyal Finn, who had been a Stormtrooper. She thought about "reconditioning" too, where they emptied your heart and mind to fill them with clockwork and hate. She thought about Finn, recaptured and "reconditioned". She thought about fighting him and she couldn't do it. It was not that she thought she couldn't fight him; it was that she could not think about fighting him.

"I'm sorry," Rey said. It seemed the right thing to fill the growing silence.

Hrel got up, the shape of her outlined against the stars in the sky. "Good night, Jedi." 

The next morning, Luke sent Hrel and Lyeppias off to the ship to get zapped. Rey was starting to get a feel for it, but she was still zapped more often than not. Luke told Rey and Tahli he would teach them meditation after breakfast. If meditation meant she'd get to sleep all day like Tahli did, Rey looked forward to it.

They'd barely even sat down when Tahli sneezed and lightning shot out of his fingertips. Rey dodged, just barely, throwing herself back into a cartwheel. Luke caught the lightning in a ball above his outstretched hand.

"So much for the Force," Tahli said.

"How do you know about that?" Luke asked.

"You're Luke kriffing Skywalker! You're only the most famous person in the galaxy after Leia Organa! Of course I know you're a Jedi! You're _the_ Jedi! Deep breaths!" Tahli had sparks of lightning running up and down his arms, which he'd thrown into the air during his speech and was now slowly bringing down.

Tahli breathed in and out. In and out. In and out.

It seemed unfair that Lyeppias was the only one who didn't know she was being taught the Force. Rey would tell her, as soon as her and Hrel returned from Luke's ship.

As if on cue, Hrel and Lyeppias rushed over the top of the nearest hill, as if the entire First Order was after them. The Force spiked and warped. Kylo Ren and his Knights were following.

They'd tracked her, Rey thought. Someway, somehow, Kylo Ren had reached through the Force and found her location inside her head and she hadn't even noticed.

Hrel and Lyeppias reached her level and Luke stepped out in front of them.

Behind her, Rey heard Lyeppias shout, in a voice so shocked it was barely a whisper, "What the fuck."

Luke handed Rey a lightsaber. She took it, spun and charged at Kylo Ren. Kylo Ren was no longer bleeding out. Rey had trained -- and sparring against Hrel and Luke had told her some of Kylo Ren's tells -- but it was still a fairer fight than it had been the last time. 

Rey spun and stabbed and Kylo Ren swung his lightsaber. He was growing complacent. She let him.

She spun and dodged and saw Luke parry blows from two of the Knights. A strand of her hair caught against his blade and an acrid smell filled the air.

When Kylo Ren swung again, she jumped back. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Hrel was backing away from one of the Knights, hands open, weaponless. The wind howled over the edge of the cliff.

Rey stabbed and crouched low to avoid a swing. Her knees burned from the strain. Behind Kylo Ren, she saw Tahli throw lightning at another of the Knights. 

She swung her lightsaber as she got out of her crouch, slicing Kylo Ren's lightsaber in two, leaving him with only one sputtering hilt blade in hand.

She smiled.

Terror flickered briefly in Kylo Ren's eyes, followed by -- triumph?

"Stop." The Knight who had spoken was female and there was enough Force-suggestion in her voice that Rey threw a glance over her shoulder.

The Knight was holding a lightsaber the length of a dagger to Lyeppias' throat. The Knight said, "Let's talk."

"Let Lyeppias go," Luke replied.

"I'm not giving up my only leverage," the Knight said.

"Take me instead," Luke said and threw aside his lightsaber. 

As Luke stepped forward, Rey could have sworn she heard someone grumble about _stupid self-sacrificing Skywalkers_. Once Luke was in range, the Knight tossed Lyeppias to the side and put her lightsaber at Luke's throat.

The world stood still.

Then the Knight spoke again, "Kylo, what do we do now?" 

"We kill everyone else," Kylo Ren said. "Hrel."

Distantly, horribly, Rey saw Hrel snap to attention.

"You've been led astray by the light. Join us." He was looking at Rey as he spoke.

"No." Lyeppias stood, hand outstretched and Luke's lightsaber flew to her. She turned it on. Against the sky and the setting sun, she looked like what Rey imagined the Jedi of the Old Republic had looked like -- a hero. 

Lyeppias looked down at the blade in her hands and said, "Sure would have been nice if I'd had some kriffing training."

She threw the lightsaber. Everyone's eyes followed its curve through the air. Rey turned around and bashed Kylo Ren upside the head with the handle of her lightsaber. He collapsed. Rey looked up to find everyone staring at Hrel, who was holding Luke's lightsaber.

Everyone burst into action like a spell had been broken. 

Rey rushed the closest conscious knight, jumping over Kylo Ren's body in the process. She brought her lightsaber down. The Knight barely blocked her blow. His lightsaber blade looked worse than Kylo Ren's -- almost like it could blow up at any moment. 

They fought. 

It was an easy fight. Rey was faster, stronger and he telegraphed his blows like no one on Jakku would have, if they'd wanted to last a week.

Rey slammed her shoulder into his chest. He let out a sound while his breathing cut off. Rey planted a foot on his chest and aimed her lightsaber at his face.

"Give me your lightsaber." She pressed down with her foot. "Now."

He held it up, blade still on. She dug in her heel. He switched it off. She took it, unwound a wrap around her arm and bound both lightsabers together.

"Any time you want to join in would be good!" Lyeppias said. She was throwing rocks at the Knight she was fighting.

Rey ran to her side, but Hrel was faster. Hrel had a lightsaber in each hand now, one Luke's, one red. 

"We thought you'd died," the Knight they were all three of them facing said. "We found your lightsaber in a crashed ship. I can't believe Osen kept the thing."

Hrel gave Luke's lightsaber to Lyeppias and didn't take her eyes off the Knight. "I never wanted to fight any of you! You should have let me stay dead."

"We should have," said a third Knight. 

Tahli and Luke joined the fray. Luke had a lightsaber in one hand and a lightdagger in the other, both red. The second Knight attacked Tahli who shot him with lightning. Tahli made fingerblasters.

"I'll take the one on the left," Lyeppias said. 

And she did. She didn't use her lightsaber, she just lifted the Knight off the ground and threw him into a nearby boulder.

She lifted the last knight, the one who had said they should have left Hrel dead. "Hrel. You want to do the honours?"

Hrel shook her head. Then something shifted and she nodded. 

She ignited her lightsaber again. The red light cast harsh shadows over the planes of her face. Her eyes looked yellow in the instant before she got on the attack.

Rey felt it. She couldn't not. It was like the pull of a black hole and it centred on the inside of Hrel's chest.

Why hadn't she killed Kylo Ren and the other Knight, Rey asked herself. She could have. It would have been easy and made things so much simpler. She turned on one of the blades on her lightsaber-staff. It was the red one.

She joined the fight.

Hrel sliced at the last Knight standing and Rey blocked her. The shock travelled up her arms and into her shoulders as she braced her back into it.

"Step aside, Jedi," Hrel said.

"You're my friend," Rey said. "I'm not letting you do this."

Hrel collapsed. She shouted at the stars and tears rolled down her face. Rey folded her arms around her. Lyeppias put a hand on Hrel's shoulder, wriggling it under Rey's arm.

As the others fell in around her, Rey detached herself and stepped away.

The Knight whose lightsaber she'd stolen was helping Kylo Ren to his feet. Rey turned on both blades of her makeshift staff. She thought about the knife at Lyeppias' throat, about the friends Hrel wouldn't fight saying they would have left her to die, and inside her the black hole grew. It spun and twisted in her gut. 

The Dark side was a disease, a corruption, an infection like the sandfevers of Jakku, and it was inside her now. It'd always been.

She'd survived the sandfevers. She could survive this.

"Go," she said to the gathered Knights of Ren. You couldn't survive the sandfevers alone, so she added, "Or stay. But if you fight you'll lose."

"What she said," Tahli said from where he was hugging Hrel.

"I always welcome new apprentices," Luke said. It took an effort of will on Rey's part not to laugh.

"I'll stay," said Osen, who'd kept a dead friend's lightsaber.

Kylo Ren snarled. "Don't you dare --"

"You're not the boss of us," Hrel told him. Her eyes were red-rimmed, but dry.

"Maybe we'll actually get some kriffing training," Lyeppias said. She looked pointed at Luke and he looked away.

"That'd be nice," Rey said.


End file.
